26 March 2009

The long-gun registry has been a bane in the North where hunting and sport shooting are part of the culture and popular pastimes for both residents and visitors.

The root objection to the gun registry is that it targets the wrong people. It's a rural solution to an urban problem.

Implemented as a crime-preventative measure, the long-gun registry has simply been an unwieldy and intrusive colossal waste of money that penalizes law-abiding hunters, farmers and recreational shooters and does nothing to enhance public safety.

Since its implementation in 2003, it has cost Canadians more than $2 billion but has never solved or prevented a single crime.

The point to remember is that handguns in Canada have required a special "restricted registration" since the 1930s.

That, of course, didn't stop the "natural governing party" from awarding hundreds of millions of dollars in software and hardware contracts to their corporate pals... while claiming they were battling crime.

And guess what... even with the really abysmal compliance rate, the damn thing still doesn't work.

Chew on that for a minute... and unless you're a complete idiot... you're gonna be clamouring for your two billion dollars back.

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comments:

The long-gun registry has been a bane in the North where hunting and sport shooting are part of the culture and popular pastimes for both residents and visitors.

The root objection to the gun registry is that it targets the wrong people. It's a rural solution to an urban problem.

Implemented as a crime-preventative measure, the long-gun registry has simply been an unwieldy and intrusive colossal waste of money that penalizes law-abiding hunters, farmers and recreational shooters and does nothing to enhance public safety.

Since its implementation in 2003, it has cost Canadians more than $2 billion but has never solved or prevented a single crime.

The reasons are obvious. Illegal smuggling by organized crime is by far the principal source of firearms on our urban streets. Gang members and armed criminals don't register their guns. And the vast majority of gun-related offences are being committed with handguns, not hunting rifles or shotguns.

So if the registry is completely missing the target and not addressing the problem it was designed to, why has the government been so slow in getting rid of it?

It's because at a time when we have a rise in shootings and gang-related crime on the streets of Toronto and Vancouver, getting rid of the registry would open the government up to criticism from the anti-gun lobby and from urban voters who have no connection with hunting or recreational shooting.

Former public safety minister Stockwell Day tabled two bills before the last election aimed at abolishing the long-gun registry but both died in the face of opposition from the Liberals, NDP and Bloc Québécois.

However, the issue is being revisited through a private member's bill from a Conservative backbencher. Prime Minister Stephen Harper has openly supported this latest effort.

The question remains whether Liberal and NDP members will also support it. NDP Leader Jack Layton has spoken against the bill, suggesting as it is currently worded, the bill would "make our streets more dangerous."

Layton's statement places a number of Northern Ontario MPs in an interestingly awkward position, since the NDP have a bloc of support throughout the North where the gun registry law is not popular at all.

If there's any consolation, there's a parliamentary tradition of relaxing party discipline and letting MPs vote their consciences or the wishes of their constituents when dealing with private members' bills.

We will certainly be watching closely how Charlie Angus (NDP -- Timmins-James Bay) and other Northeastern Ontario MPs represent their constituents' interests on this issue. Let's hope they all take aim and shoot down the gun registry once and for all.

Lets be clear though, the gun 'registry' is inefficient waste of money.

Gun safety training is not and neither are gun storage safety laws.

Too often Liberals portray 'conservatives' as being gun freaks who want everyone to have a fully loaded assault rifle next to their bed at night. (Or something similar) When in truth we just oppose wasteful spending on a program that does nothing to reduce crime or keep people safe.

*"jag says... as a law-abiding citizen, he duly sent in his application for his five guns, complete with cheque."

similar story here.

g-dad got all excited about this when it first came in... so on the day before the deadline, i sent in a registered letter for him, listing all his rifles and asking for further instructions on how to proceed.

I find it strange that for $2 billion the gun registry is still all screwed up. After the mad cow thing the agriculture world (for 7 or 8 milliom$$) put in a computerized system that can trace a cow right to the stall it was born in. Do ya think they should give every gun owner a cow.

b) apache and mysql are pretty safe but nothing is perfect which means you made a great argument for not keeping a list of owners of long guns as per (a).

c) innocent people who are incarcerated is not what we are talking about. that is a terrible thing but a different issue. the crawl of our justice system is another issue that shouldn't punish victims and future victims when the criminal gets off early simply because the justice system is slow.